“Demons?” Tank said. “Like Az?”
“Az will return,” I whispered. “That’s what the guardian said at the library, before we sent it back into its book.”
“It makes sense,” Tank said. “The flowstones on the goblin map, in the history book and in the photo match. They are all connected to this stadium.”
“That’s because Slurp Stadium isn’t just a stadium,” I said. The scattered pieces of the puzzle snapped into place. “It’s a gateway to the world where Az the demon is trapped.”
Tank’s ears snapped to attention on her head. “The Codex Army!” she said. “Remember how he talked about bringing his army to life? Codex is going to use the flowstone under Slurp Stadium to bring Az the demon back to Rockfall Mountain. That’s what he’s planning for tonight!”
Around us the battle-bot preparations continued. Monsters of all shapes and sizes were gearing up for a night of action. Little did they know what was really in store for them.
“A demon like Az would destroy Slick City,” Aleetha said.
I gulped. “I think that’s the idea.”
Finding out your town’s new battle-bot arena is actually a gate for releasing an ancient demon is enough to turn anyone off sports.
“We have to stop the battle-bot tournament,” I said. “We have to tell someone.”
“Who is going to believe us, Fizz?” Aleetha said.
“We could try Detective Hordish again,” Tank said. “I saw the police earlier outside the stadium entrance.”
“Where are they now? The police could stop the tournament,” Aleetha said. She rolled up the map and history-book page and tucked them into the folds of her wizard’s robe. “It’s a long shot, but it could work.”
It was a really long shot. Hordish thought we were behind the Codex hoaxes. Now we had to convince him to shut down the biggest event in the city’s newest stadium to stop the Codex.
“Let’s find our old friend Detective Hordish,” I said.
Tank led the way through the crowd. We hadn’t gotten very far when the speakers around the stadium buzzed to life.
“Attention, battle-bot fans! Find your seats. The action is about to begin!”
A horde of monsters hurried to their seats. Trolls, goblins and ogres all moved in the same direction. Unfortunately, it was the opposite of the way we were heading. We pushed against the crowd, but we didn’t get far. We were like three haggle fish swimming upstream.
“We’ll never find Hordish in time!” Aleetha shouted over the pre-battle noise.
She was right. In the crush of monsters, we would never find the detective or any other Slick City police officer. All I could see were eager battle-bot fans making their way to their seats. And one lone goblin on the edge of the crowd, quietly moving along the wall and away from the battle-bot arena.
The mayor’s assistant had tried to warn Mayor Grimlock about the stadium. Did he know about the flowstone underneath the playing field? Maybe if we showed Rufus the map, he could convince the mayor to stop the tournament in time. The chance of that happening was fatter than the mayor himself, but with no cops around, it was all we had.
“Change of plan,” I shouted.
We got to the edge of the crowd just as Rufus slipped through a door labeled Employees Only. I pushed my way to the door, with Aleetha and Tank at my tail. It was unlocked. Finally, a little luck to go with my long shots and fat chances.
We slipped through the door. A narrow passage led up to the top of the stadium. There was no sign of Rufus.
Halfway up the stairs, the wall gave way to a large window overlooking the battle-bot arena below.
The first battle was already underway. The Rawlins Reaper faced off against a battle bot with a snake’s head and metal fangs. It looked like it could be a fair fight, except Rizzo’s bot moved like a ramped-up zip beetle. Snake Head could hardly keep up with the Reaper’s movements. My scales bristled at the sight of the cheating kobold.
“Easy, Fizz,” Tank said, trying to pull me away from the window. “We’ll deal with Rizzo another day.”
“Right now, we have a demon to stop,” Aleetha said.
The crowd below us cheered. Rizzo’s Reaper had Snake Head on its back. It looked like the fight was over for the snake bot. Before Rizzo could deliver the final blow, the lights went out. The entire stadium was plunged into darkness.
The jumbo screen hanging over the middle of the arena lit up the darkness. The purple glow from the screen cast eerie shadows across the confused monsters in their seats. My anger at Rizzo vanished when the face of the Codex appeared on the screen.
“Greetings, Slick City!” the Codex’s voice boomed over the stadium’s speakers. “Mayor Grimlock, I warned you not to open this stadium.”
“Oh no,” Tank said. “We’re too late.”
All around the stadium, the monsters were stunned into silence.
“You have had plenty of time to listen to me, Slick City!”
My ears perked up when the Codex spoke. His words blasted through the stadium speakers, but they also came from somewhere close by.
Without a word, I moved silently along the narrow corridor. Tank and Aleetha followed. Together, we quietly climbed another set of stairs and came to the end of the corridor.
You know that feeling you get when you try to stop a demon from being summoned but accidentally help summon it? It definitely takes the shine off your scales.
When Az climbed through the flowstone, most monsters in the crowd thought it was part of the show. They cheered at the battle to come. When Az started smashing holes in the walls of the battle arena, the cheers turned to screams. After that, everything was a mess.
As Az stomped around the arena, smashing the walls and tearing down pillars, monsters of all sizes scrambled for the exits.
We watched the destruction unfold through the window overlooking the arena. I was mad, but mostly at myself. Rufus was the Codex. He wasn’t planning to summon the demon. He was trying to stop the demon from being summoned.
“Why didn’t you just warn the mayor?” I said.
“I did!” Rufus snapped. “I told him over and over again. Do you think he’d listen to me? No way! What did I know? I’m just a dumb goblin.”
“A goblin who knows his history,” Tank said.
“Exactly,” Rufus said. He stomped away from the window and picked up the piece of equipment I had knocked from his hands when I tackled him. He turned it over, checking it for damage. “No one cares about history, so we are doomed to repeat it. Our ancestors used the flowstones to banish the demons. Now, all the tech-loving monsters don’t even believe flowstones are real!”
“I believe they are real,” I said.
Rufus looked up from the circuit board.
“It’s a little late,” he said. “I invented the Codex to get the mayor’s attention. Even then, the big oaf wouldn’t listen. He was more interested in building a big shiny sports stadium with SlurpCo’s money.”
Slurp Stadium was no longer shiny. Az the demon was seeing to that. Another crash of falling rocks echoed across the st
adium.
Tank was right. In the whole stadium, there wasn’t a single Slick City police officer. It was as if Detective Hordish’s whole department had decided to take a bathroom break. Talk about bad timing.
Rufus laughed at Tank’s question. He worked at the circuit board with a pair of small pliers, trying to bend it back into shape.
“The police aren’t even allowed in the stadium,” he said. “SlurpCo insisted its own bots run security for these events.”
“That’s why we couldn’t find them!” I said.
“Why would the police agree to being kept out of the stadium?” Aleetha said.
“They didn’t,” Rufus said. “Mayor Grimlock ordered them to stay out.”
Aleetha wasn’t convinced. “Why would he do that?”
“Because Sanzin from SlurpCo told him to,” Rufus said. “Mayor Grimlock does whatever that troll tells him to.”
“If the SlurpCo security bots are in charge, why aren’t they stopping Az?” I said.
Rufus shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe they’re waiting for orders?”
“We don’t have time to wait,” I said. “We have to do something.”
I had no idea what that something should be, but I knew it had to be done.
“I am doing something,” Rufus said. “I’m learning that you broke my remote bot compiler when you tackled me.”
“Remote what?” I said.
Rufus held up a twisted circuit board with crooked wires dangling off one side.
“The remote bot compiler. It was the key to stopping Az from eating Slick City. Then you decided to jump on me like we were playing mudball.” He tossed the compiler to the ground. “Now it will make a fine paperweight.”
I didn’t think I could feel any worse. Slick City was going to be destroyed, and it was all my fault. I wanted to jump through the flowstone and never come back.
“It’s hopeless,” I said.
“Pretty much,” Rufus said.
“That doesn’t mean we stop trying.” Aleetha stood by the window, watching as Az smashed the stadium below.
“It’s no use. Once Az is out of the stadium, he’ll tear up Slick City,” I said. “It will take all the wizards in the Shadow Tower to stop him. If they even can.”
“Or maybe just a few brave monsters,” Rufus said.
“What are you talking about?” I said.
“You destroyed the remote bot compiler, but that doesn’t mean you can’t compile the bots manually.”
“Me?” I said. “I don’t even know what any of that means.”
“You don’t have to,” Rufus said. “You just have to find that Rawlins brat and his battle bot. Inside that machine is the manual bot compiler. Turn it on and we have a chance.”
Tank’s ears perked up at the mention of Rizzo Rawlins.
“Why does Rizzo have a manual bot compiler in his battle bot?” she said.
“He doesn’t know that’s what he has.” Rufus’s tail wagged back and forth faster than a sugared-up zip lizard. “The switch is buried inside the battle-bot processor unit the Codex gave him.”
“The one he fished from the garbage earlier this week?” Tank said.
“The very one,” Rufus said.
“I knew Rizzo was cheating!” I said.
I jumped to high-five Tank’s waiting hand. Finally, we had proof that Rizzo had the Codex’s processor in his battle bot. Another roar from Az erupted from the arena floor and cut our celebration short.
More screams from fleeing monsters followed the roar, but I wasn’t scared anymore. We were right about Rizzo cheating. We had tracked down the Codex. If the cops and SlurpCo guards weren’t going to stop the demon, then we would do that too. Somehow.
“All right, I’ll do it,” I said. “Tell us what we have to do.”
Rufus laid out his plan. We didn’t like any of it. Not a single word.
But it didn’t matter what we thought. If we wanted to save Slick City, we were going to have to get real close to Az the demon.
We crept along the stadium seats, high above Az and his wall smashing.
“He’s nearly through the wall,” Tank said. “If we don’t get down to the arena floor soon, we’ll never stop him from destroying the city.”
“The stairs aren’t far,” Aleetha said. “Keep moving.”
Ahead of us, a narrow set of stairs ran all the way down to the front-row seats. The plan was to hurry down those, hop over the fence, and save the day. It was a little light on details, but it’s hard to plan when there’s a demon hammering the walls around you.
The stadium shook with another smash from Az. Only a few more strikes and he would be through that wall and free to take the carnage on the road. All the action was down on the arena floor, but something small and shiny above us caught my attention.
Everything hurt. Getting smashed and thrown through the air by a demon will do that to you, I guess.
I crash-landed on the arena floor and lay there for what felt like a very long time. Eventually, things came into focus.
The floor was covered in busted battle-bot parts and smashed pieces of the stadium. There was no sign of Tank or Aleetha. My scales burned at the thought of them being under one of those piles of stone. I wanted to run and search for them, but Az had beaten me to it. The demon picked through the rubble near the spot he had just smashed. He was looking for survivors, but he wasn’t planning on kissing their boo-boos better. If Tank and Aleetha were under that pile, I had to find another way to help them.
Not far from my landing spot lay the crushed frame of the Rawlins Reaper. Rizzo’s battle bot had not survived Az’s attack. Next to the destroyed battle bot lay an equally crushed snarkdog vendor’s cart. The cart’s colorful awning was spread across the ground like a picnic blanket. A furry and familiar tail stuck out from under the awning.
I scrambled to my feet and ran for the cart. All the pain from my fall vanished at the opportunity lying in front of me. I threw back the awning.
“Get out from under there, Rizzo,” I said.
The kobold jumped when he saw me.
“Is it gone? Don’t let it get me!” Rizzo’s fur stood on end, and his snout was covered in tears.
The big bully was crying. Normally, I’d take a bit of pleasure in this, as payback for all the noogies, wedgies and scale-scrapes he had given me. Right now, there wasn’t time. I got down to business.
“Open your bot, Rizzo. I need to see what’s underneath.”
Even with the tears, the whimpering and the demon smashing up the place, Rizzo was defiant.
“No way, Fizzle!” he barked. “That’s my bot. Only I can open it. Besides, I ain’t running any illegal equipment.”
Do bullies ever take a day off? Something inside me snapped. Maybe it was the guardian in the library, or my flying off Mayor Grimlock’s balcony on Tank’s spybot. Or maybe it was the fact that Tank and Aleetha could be smushed for all I knew. Whatever it was, I’d had enough of schoolyard bullies like Rizzo Rawlins.
I grabbed Rizzo by his
tail and dragged him out from under the awning.
“Listen here, Rizzo,” I snarled. “I know you took equipment from the Codex. I know that equipment is inside this battle bot. I know it makes your bot move faster than any other bot in the competition. I know you cheated. But I also know that doesn’t matter anymore. What matters is that we stop that demon. Open this battle bot. Right now!”
Rizzo gulped. His ears flattened against his head.
“Okay, Fizz. Calm down. You only had to ask.”
He pawed his access code into the bot’s case. A hatch popped open with a faint hiss to reveal the circuitry underneath. I didn’t understand half of it, but it looked impressive.
I searched the wires and circuits for the button Rufus had told me about. I found it quickly. The manual bot compiler. I had no idea what it did. But Rufus insisted it was our only chance, and I wasn’t too picky at this point.
“What are you doing?” Rizzo whined.
“I’m saving your furry behind.”
I reached out to press the button.
And was yanked back by my tail.
“Finish him!” Sanzin shouted.
Immediately, Az stopped searching the rubble and turned to face me. The demon responded to Sanzin’s command and stomped closer. The arena shook with every step.
“I will enjoy watching you play with my demon,” Sanzin called down from the safety of the SlurpCo box seats. “But don’t take too long. I still have to help Mayor Grimlock spin this ‘demon on a rampage’ disaster into a triumph for rebuilding Slick City. With help from the SlurpCo construction company, of course.”
“You’re destroying Slick City just so your construction company can rebuild it?” I struggled against the security bot’s tight grip, but it was no use.
“Pretty much,” Sanzin said. “And there’s the whole ‘having a demon at your command’ thing. That will come in handy, when SlurpCo Industries expands beyond Slick City.”
The Case of the Battling Bots Page 7
